Daily Inspiration: Meet Mia Wilder

Today we’d like to introduce you to Mia Wilder.

Mia, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
My mother recalls me saying, almost as soon as I could talk, that I wanted to be on the other side of the little box TV screen. I always felt like the world was such a vibrant and honest place and my life belonged there. While the reality of it is somewhat less glamorous, I am so grateful everyday that I get to play and create for a living. I was born and raised in India, and so sure I wanted to leave it to see the world and be an actress. Honestly, I was so overwhelmed! Not by the culture or anything, but by how confident and driven everyone was. I was suddenly surrounded by the most talented and beautiful people in the world and I was just out of high school in a small town. But it was these people, some of whom became like family to me, that pushed me to grow out of all my insecurities and self-doubt and honestly become the artist I am today.

That’s how it started at least. I feel like once you take your first big leap, it’s just a matter of sticking to it and prioritizing it every day after. Which is really the hardest part.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I feel like this has been the biggest struggle for me and I still very much deal with it. It’s believing in your work, every day before anyone else does. Like you have to be so confident that this story or this song is important and NEEDS to be told, more than anything. And put all your time, money and heart into it before anyone can see what you see, what it could be.

But I can say it’s 100% worth it because every time someone quotes my lyrics to me or tells me that my words made them feel seen or comforted them or even just made them smile, it honestly makes my day! And I’m happy to do it all over again.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am a model, actress, writer and singer-songwriter. I feel very grateful having been able to work on campaigns for Microsoft, Benefit Cosmetics and Phoenix Marketcity. But I am probably most known as a writer. I wrote a book of poems over the course of my first two years in LA and honestly, adulthood. Abstraction (of an eternal spring) is an incredible honest body of work that explores the madness and magic of being a young girl in this world, for real. I never planned on publishing it especially since I talk about my personal life so openly and about my experience with sexual abuse. But I spent a long time believing that my experiences, my lifestyle and my decisions were “wrong” just because no one wanted to talk about them. When I saw the impact my poems had on people and saw that it made them feel SEEN or even a little bit more understood, I knew it was important to work and had to shared. After this, I released my first single, Always, a spoken word poem with a beautiful soundtrack that feels like falling in love. I wanted to create a love story that was messy and real to me. Not set in the suburbs, but right on Olympic and Alvarado, to two young people who met at a house party in Del Rey who couldn’t possibly promise each other anything because, you know, it’s LA.

As an artist, I want to romanticize my reality as I know it and I want to create a space for people like me who are reckless and young and gritty to feel like we get songs and poems and fairy tales too and we can talk about our life honestly and feel like it is its own kind of beautiful.

I am currently working on an EP that I am super excited to share. It’s moody, adventurous, romantic and each one explores a different story.

I have found myself falling more and more in love with music and the musicians I am learning from and working with. Though this is somewhat new territory for me, I am really excited to deep dive in.

In the meantime, I am modeling, acting and eagerly awaiting the day that it’s safe for me to travel and take my work with me.

Any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general?
The best advice I can give is to surround yourself with people who do what you want to do and do it bigger. Even if you’re just volunteering to help set up an event or helping out on set. Go there to watch them work, learn all the lingo, learn how to carry yourself and communicate with other people. Watch really closely and start working like the person you came to be as if you already are them. Besides the social and networking skills, I’ve also learned how to model entirely by watching other models, on set if I could, but even just on Youtube or Instagram. Besides learning from it, you’re also manifesting the kind of life you want and I’m a BIG believer in manifestation. I’ll also warn you that you will feel small and often like the most useless person in the room, I know I did. But that just means you have so much room to grow. Don’t feel small, refocus that feeling into gratefulness, that even on your worst day, even when you’re running late or didn’t get the part, you still get to wake up and do the thing you love most, all over again.

Pricing:

• Buy Abstraction (of an Eternal Spring) on the website at $ 9.99

Contact Info:

• Email: themiawilder@gmail.com
• Instagram: @themiawilder
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mia.wilder.37/
• Twitter: miawilder17
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Em1EhWHScs